Trying to break 90 again: Arnold Palmer's putting magic

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After only golfing for the past five years, Dave Tindall is trying to break 90 for the first time in more than a decade. Follow his journey here.

One shortcut to getting my score down is taking fewer putts.

In my return round of 102 a few weeks ago, I hit the putter 38 times. Naturally that felt too much.

But what is an acceptable price?

One Twitter response, @dougalyd, seems to suggest that I did well. “I think that's a decent effort! He putted better than I did when I started again, I found it very difficult on the greens. “

But my partner for the day during my 102 had a different take.

“Your placement was shit.”

So where does the truth lie?

Surely I could take four or five out of that number of 38 without too much difficulty, right?

A hard graft is obviously the most likely answer but, like every golfer, I am tempted by the idea of ​​rapid improvement.

Thankfully, as I was pondering my next move, I remembered a book review that Matt Cooper at Golf365 did on the site recently.

The book was John Richardson's 50 Greatest Golf Tips and Matt had written this about the art of putting.

“One of my favorite tips is about placement and the impact was extraordinary. Within hours of reading the tip I was on the course and hitting long putt after long putt.

“Finding the trophy has never been easy. It was amazing.”

So what on earth was this?

Finding the groove

Tip, No. 27 in the book of John, it reads as follows:

“When I was young, I played golf with my older brother. One day he had a particularly 'hot' day with a putter. I noticed what he was doing, I was tired of him hitting me, I asked how he was putting it so well.

“He explained that he was imagining a clear channel in the grass that went from the ball directly to the hole. After learning the putt, all he had to do was confidently place the ball in the fairway.

“As long as he hit the ball at the right pace, the groove did the rest. We both used this method and hit great putts – it felt like magic.

“This technique still helps with my confidence when it comes to long putts and many other aspects of my game.”

The inspiration, John revealed, came from Arnold Palmer, who wrote the following in the foreword to Ray Floyd's book, 'The Elements of Scoring'.

Palmer had written: “When I was having trouble putting, Raymond told me to think of the ball as a little train on a track straight to the hole.

“'Now, Arnold,' said he, 'you must really believe it's a train. We who believe are inhaling the smoke.' It's a course I've visited many times since.”

Well, if it works for Arnold Palmer and Ray Floyd – 11 Majors between them – that's fine with me.

So, I headed to the local course near me, Northcliffe Golf Club in West Yorkshire, and thanks to local pro Dave Delaney I had access to their putting green.

At this point, it would be fun to write that I took Palmer's advice on board and watched the magic happen. And that I drove home on cloud nine.

But it didn't work that way.

No, it wasn't that the advice didn't work; it was just a matter of not being able to use it.

Why? Dave asked me to hit a few putts and – being a friend – actually told me that my stroke was horrible. It's a flippy, wrist-cocking shambles that will never yield any consensus. He said it with a smile and when he showed me the video, I laughed a little at how good he was.

Back to basics

So instead of believing that putts are going down railroad tracks, Dave went back to the basics and gave me an alignment tip: use a marker on my Nike Method putter.

That worked quickly as all my previous putts were coming off the toes.

His second tip was about keeping a tighter left wrist and keeping my hands and putter moving at the same speed, aided by a device strapped to my watch band.

With head pro Matt also taking out small gates to practice aligning and keeping the clubface of my putter square, there was an immediate improvement in my consistency.

No more crooked wrists and clubface trying to replicate the tennis swing of the past but straight lines, less movement and better results.

Sometimes you have to walk before you run. Using the brushing techniques I have now, I will be ready to try something unusual, imaginative and ambitious in the future.

You can try Arnie's train lines now if your setup is correct. But I just want to get the basics down little by little.

As I go, Dave thinks I can get those 38 putts in quick. It's a good note to end on.

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